


Perfection

by misanthropiclycanthrope



Category: Burnt (2015)
Genre: Extended Scene, Friends to Lovers, M/M, with added feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-28 06:24:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16236005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misanthropiclycanthrope/pseuds/misanthropiclycanthrope
Summary: Adam discovers that there's more to be gained from success than fireworks, immortality, and three Michelin stars.Or, an alternative take on Tony delivering the good news.





	Perfection

**Author's Note:**

  * For [writingmonsters](https://archiveofourown.org/users/writingmonsters/gifts).



> Dedicated to writingmonsters for having to suffer my constant gloom.

The Thames is calm and gray, passing below serene and untroubled and everything Adam is not. He’s plagued by a restless itch, awaiting the news, the verdict. A _need_. But it’s not a hit he’s craving, not this time. It’s validation.

Absolution.

He’s never been a very patient man, and two and a half years is a helluva long time to wait for the one thing that will make it all worth it. All the pain, the betrayal.

And if it’s a no? If he’s failed?

More than two years of self-imposed exile, all for nothing.

He can almost hear the thunder of approaching hoofbeats.

Movement in his peripheral vision, and he knows it’s Tony before he turns his head. This is it: the judgment, the reckoning.

The answer is written on Tony’s face, in the smile that lights his eyes, and the relief that sweeps through Adam is profound, overwhelming, a high more intense than any drug could ever produce.

He looks up to the sky, sending up thanks to a god he lost faith in long ago. But maybe there _was_ something – some _one_ – looking out for him, steering him right even when he veered severely off course. Not something abstract and intangible, but so, so real, and he had just been too blind to see it. Too blind to realize.

Tony is still looking at him, that pleased, proud smile, and all Adam can do is smile back at him, can’t quite figure out what to say, how to express how truly happy he feels for the first time in years.

It doesn’t matter. Tony knows.

It’s as much a victory for Tony as it is for Adam, the three star Michelin rating awarded to his restaurant, proof of his own success too, something to make his father proud. But Tony isn’t thinking of himself. And perhaps that’s always been a weakness of his, one Adam is guilty of unfairly exploiting.

_You know he’s in love with you, don’t you?_

_Yes._

“You did it.”

Adam shakes his head, his smile still in place, softer now as he looks at the man who has gifted him the chance to prove himself, to show he can be better.

“No, Tony.” There’s a flicker of confusion in those warm brown eyes before Adam continues. “ _We_ did it. Together.”

A gentle laugh, and there’s the smile that always makes Tony look younger. Carefree. Just as he is in Adam’s memories, from before everything went to hell and it all becomes a hazy patchwork of vague recollections churning in a sea of liquor.

Tony pushes away from the wall, intending to give Adam the time he needs to let the news really settle in. To hit home. But Adam doesn’t want him to go, wants to share this, because if he’s still alone hasn’t it all been for nothing?

Tony gives a start at the hand on his wrist, and when he turns back there’s a wariness in his eyes.

Adam won’t ask for forgiveness. He’s asked too much already. But he needs Tony to know how grateful he is, how he could never have achieved any of this without him, how he doesn't deserve any of it, how much he wants to…

How much he _wants_.

He feels Tony’s jolt of surprise as he kisses him, the way he tenses beneath Adam’s hands. Just like before. He stands there rigidly and lets it happen like he believes he’s not allowed to enjoy it. That it could never mean what he wants it to mean.

It’s not what Adam had intended.

Released, Tony looks away, out across the river, his ears now tipped with pink.

“Tony.”

Tony clears his throat, a quiet little cough, and he nods. Accepting what he thinks is Adam’s gratitude, that it was just a way of saying thank you. Of expressing relief and joy too immense to contain. Like the last time.

Adam Jones. Perpetual fuck-up.

“ _Tony_.”

With gentle hands, he turns Tony back to him, waits until his gaze lifts reluctantly to his face. He hopes his smile says enough, never has been good at expressing his feelings with words. Not outside of a kitchen.

Tony must see it, but there’s still uncertainty, doubt, a lifetime’s worth of rejection for which Adam is to blame. But there’s also something else. A tentative seed of hope he’s afraid to nurture to life.

“Adam?” It’s little more than a whisper.

Adam reels him in, pulling him close and holding him in place as he bends to kiss him again. Properly. The kind of kiss that can leave no doubt as to the emotion behind it.

It takes Tony a moment, but he gradually relaxes, the tension bleeding from his body as he melts into Adam, hands clutching at the apron he still wears like he’s afraid Adam will disappear. Again.

That’s not going to happen. Not now. He’s been granted a second chance, another life, and this time he won’t throw it all away. He’d returned from oblivion in search of a star, only to find so much more. Something truly worth the fight, the pain.

There will be celebrations and fireworks, all of them sharing their success as a team – a _family_ – and he will congratulate and thank every single one of them, for this is as much their victory as it is his. But for now, this is all he needs.

Forget immortality. Adam has secured a prize far more valuable.

One he will never spurn again.


End file.
